Plans in place at Hospital to deal with Junior Doctors’ strike

The planned strikes are set to take place from: 08:00 Tuesday 12 January to 08:00 Wednesday 13 January (but all emergency care will be staffed)

08:00 Tuesday 26 January to 08:00 Thursday 28 January (but all emergency care will be staffed)

08:00 to 17:00 Wednesday 10 February (proposed full walk-out of junior staff)

The Trust, which runs Royal Blackburn Hospital, Burnley General Hospital, and community hospitals in Accrington, Pendle and Clitheroe, has plans in place to deal with the planned industrial action and is working closely with the local Clinical Commissioning Groups (CCGs) to ensure there are robust measures that protect the safety, welfare and service that it provides to patients. However, a small number of elective operations and clinics have had to be cancelled – if you have not been contacted, then please attend as normal. Dr Damian Riley, Medical Director at the Trust said: “Patients in need of urgent and emergency care will continue to receive the treatment they need, when they need it. However, due to increased pressures on the Trust over this period, those in less urgent need of care may experience longer waiting times than normal and some elective operations will need to be postponed or rearranged — these patients are being contacted now and we apologise for the inconvenience this will cause. However, in all cases, priority will be given to those with the most pressing health needs to ensure that we can continue to provide safe, personal and effective care to all our patients. Our A&E continues to be extremely busy and we have been assured by our local CCGs that the strike will have no impact on routine GP appointments or primary healthcare services so we would once again remind people to only come to A&E if it is a genuine medical emergency.”